- #1
Super**Nova
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Inventing Moons and their Eclilpses--help!
I'm not mathmatically inclined, but I don't mind learning.
I used the model of the typical eclipse seasons for Earth, and it works for Earth, but what about inventing a totally different planet with two moons? I hate guessing. I'm calculating an effect in a science fictoin story I'm writing that rides heavily on the eclipse cycles. I won't settle for the typical writer writing about a fluffy full moon off the top of their head, just because they feel like writing about the moon. I want real data.
I want both moons to eclipse at different times each, but what I can't firgure out for the life of me are their eclipse cycles (length of eclipse season per moon, how many seasons per year) and where the nodes would land per moon, per year, for at least 8 years.
The planet's orbit takes 722 days to complete.
I've figured out their average synodic months; moon one's synodic month is 48 days, its sidereal month is 45.2 days. Moon two's is 80 days, and its sidereal month lasts 72.5 days.
Moon one's orbit to the ecliptic is 6.8 degrees. Moon two's is 40.3 degrees to the ecliptic.
I can't give you numbers as to how far each of the moons are from the planet. I don't yet know the speed they travel. All I know is moon one is smaller and closer, and moon two is farther and MUCH larger, about half the size of the home planet. (Tell me that works for the data given.)
Help me understand something, here. If Earth's moon orbit was tilted at 7 degrees instead of 5, how would that affect the times of eclipse? 8 degrees? Why doesn't its orbit ever stay fixed all throughout the year--why, even though it's tilted 5 degrees, why aren't the eclipse seasons perfectly 6 months apart instead of 173 days? I just don't understand how that works. Why the moon's orbit steadily reverses every 9 years and returns to the same every 18.
Anyway, regarding my invented moons, the answers I'm most concerned with are:
1). How many days, for each moon, will one eclipse season last?
2). How many eclipse seasons per year, per moon?
3). How many days to the next eclipse season per moon?
4). How many solar eclipses can either moon get per season? How many lunar eclipses per season?
Based on what I posted, please show me how you arrived to your conclusion. I hope that wasn't too much. I do need the answers to all of those in the 2nd to last paragraph, at least.
Thank you.
I'm not mathmatically inclined, but I don't mind learning.
I used the model of the typical eclipse seasons for Earth, and it works for Earth, but what about inventing a totally different planet with two moons? I hate guessing. I'm calculating an effect in a science fictoin story I'm writing that rides heavily on the eclipse cycles. I won't settle for the typical writer writing about a fluffy full moon off the top of their head, just because they feel like writing about the moon. I want real data.
I want both moons to eclipse at different times each, but what I can't firgure out for the life of me are their eclipse cycles (length of eclipse season per moon, how many seasons per year) and where the nodes would land per moon, per year, for at least 8 years.
The planet's orbit takes 722 days to complete.
I've figured out their average synodic months; moon one's synodic month is 48 days, its sidereal month is 45.2 days. Moon two's is 80 days, and its sidereal month lasts 72.5 days.
Moon one's orbit to the ecliptic is 6.8 degrees. Moon two's is 40.3 degrees to the ecliptic.
I can't give you numbers as to how far each of the moons are from the planet. I don't yet know the speed they travel. All I know is moon one is smaller and closer, and moon two is farther and MUCH larger, about half the size of the home planet. (Tell me that works for the data given.)
Help me understand something, here. If Earth's moon orbit was tilted at 7 degrees instead of 5, how would that affect the times of eclipse? 8 degrees? Why doesn't its orbit ever stay fixed all throughout the year--why, even though it's tilted 5 degrees, why aren't the eclipse seasons perfectly 6 months apart instead of 173 days? I just don't understand how that works. Why the moon's orbit steadily reverses every 9 years and returns to the same every 18.
Anyway, regarding my invented moons, the answers I'm most concerned with are:
1). How many days, for each moon, will one eclipse season last?
2). How many eclipse seasons per year, per moon?
3). How many days to the next eclipse season per moon?
4). How many solar eclipses can either moon get per season? How many lunar eclipses per season?
Based on what I posted, please show me how you arrived to your conclusion. I hope that wasn't too much. I do need the answers to all of those in the 2nd to last paragraph, at least.
Thank you.